Infants and other incontinent individuals wear absorbent articles such as diapers to receive and contain urine and other body exudates. Absorbent articles function both to contain the discharged materials and to isolate these materials from the body of the wearer and from the wearer's garments and bed clothing. Disposable absorbent articles having many different basic designs are known to the art. For example, U.S. Pat. Re. No. 26,152, entitled "Disposable Diaper" issued to Duncan and Baker on Jan. 31, 1967, describes a disposable diaper which has achieved wide acceptance and commercial success. In order to provide better fit and reduced leakage about the leg of the wearer, absorbent articles have been provided with elastic leg closures, elastic waist features, and elasticized side panels. U.S. Pat. No. 3,860,003, entitled "Contractable Side Portions For Disposable Diaper", issued to Kenneth B. Buell on Jan. 14, 1975, describes an elasticized leg cuff disposable diaper which has achieved wide acceptance and commercial success.
However, it has been found that absorbent articles having elastic closures still have a tendency to gap away from the wearer during use. These problems have been found to be caused by the relative motions of the wearer during use. As the wearer changes position, there are significant dimensional changes in the waist, stomach, hips, buttocks, and legs. These dimensional changes are particularly noticeable for infants. The circumference of the infant from hip to hip through the buttocks is much bigger than through the front waist/stomach area. Thus, as the wearer moves, conventional diapers are unable to expand and contract in proportion to the circumference of the wearer in the hips through the buttocks due to their construction with relatively nonelastic materials. Thus, the diaper tends to sag, gap and slip to a degree that fit is degraded and the likelihood of leakage is increased. Further, since the diaper cannot expand to accomodate these circumferential changes in dimension, pressure is applied to the body that can cause skin marking.
Thus, it would be advantageous to provide an absorbent article having elastic features that provide better fit.
Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide an absorbent article having dynamic fit particularly in the hips through the buttocks.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide an absorbent article having an elastic feature that provides sustained dynamic fit as the wearer moves.
These and other objects of the present invention will be more readily apparent when considered in reference to the following description and when taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.